Death of a Salesman

"He was a happy man with a batch of cement... Nobody dast blame this man. You don't understand: Willy was a salesman. And for a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the life. He don't put a bolt to a nut, he don't tell you the law or give you medicine. He's a man out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And when they start not smiling back-that's an earthquake. And then you get yourself a couple of spots on your hat, and you're finished. Nobody dast blame this man. A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory." (Miller's play, 1968.)

Who are we? Each and every one of us is different, unique, and individual. We all have different talents, hobbies, interests, and abilities, not to mention goals. Once we develop our critical thinking skills, at the age of five or so, we start to have dreams and goals for ourselves. For instance, we may want to be a firefighter or a ballerina someday, maybe that dream or goal will change as we grow older, or maybe it will develop, but either way, we find out who we are by having these dreams and goals. But what if we deprived ourselves of what we really wanted to do, just so we could achieve a different goal, and we ultimately erased who we were supposed to be by living a life of lies?

"The quality in such plays that does shake us, however, derives from the underlying fear of being displaced, the disaster inherent in being torn away from our chosen image of what and who we are in this world." (Miller's Essay, 1971.)

In the essay that contains this sentence, Miller explains that all of our despair and embarrassment originates within our own minds, and that this is due to the pressures of society. He also continues by stressing the importance of realizing who you are in life and that whatever is distorting this needs be eliminated from our lives, so that we may continue the journey of finding ourselves. As Americans we have the freedom of speech, religion, health, and happiness; this provides numerous opportunities that await us beyond each new chapter in our lives. The chance to develop our own unique personality, achieve our humanity, secure our personal dignity, and demonstrate our hearts and spirits is endless and indestructible. But however, it is completely up to us to act upon it. Unfortunately, through our doubts and insecurities due to society's expectations, we tend to give up, never achieving the "American Dream."

Everyone has their own interpretation of this so-called "American Dream." For some it's the "Safety and Security Dream", the one with the white picket fence, two kids consisting of one boy and one girl, a two car garage attached to your very own home, and having a perfect marriage. For others it's the "Hollywood Dream", being filthy rich, owning a mansion, a ridiculously expensive car, having a basketball court in your basement, and being a member of a "strictly A-list" country club. For me, personally, it's simply being financially comfortable, with a job I not only love, but am good at, being in a happy marriage, having a family, driving a reliable automobile, owning my very own "average-sized" home, and being able to take a vacation about once a year. Though each interpretation of this so-called "American Dream" is very different, they all share the mutual goal of success. Without it, anyone's interpretation of the "American Dream" and achieving it would be an impossible goal to reach. However, in order to obtain this materialistic success, or any success for that matter, through personal and emotional growth and fulfillment, one must truly know oneself. Unfortunately, this was not the case of the Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman. We are all part of a system that pushes the lie that materialism measures the worth of people. But to take away basic human values, knowledge, community, and love is to ask for disaster, or in Willy Loman's case, self-destruction. This play is very relatable, in that many of us, if not all of us, are obsessed with our careers, success, financial goals, etc. But will our obsession with our future and achieving the "American Dream" make us successful, happy, or loved? If one isn't happy with oneself it will show in one's work, school, social life, family life, everything; ultimately stopping one from reaching one's goals.

Willy Loman's tragic goals are: his need to make an impression in his life either through financial success or merely by being well-liked by his friends and family. And since Loman is a broken-hearted salesman, he no longer lives in the real world, but rather trapped in his own delusional world; of a past he can't escape. It begins to eat away at him. He wants to provide his family with a shoe-in for greatness, no matter how lonely and sad his wife is, or how much of a womanizer his youngest son is, or how lost and confused his oldest son is. Willy's hurt and frustration toward everyone else is actually his disappointment in himself, due to his unsatisfied spirit that caused the downfall of both his family and himself. This salesman's search for happiness never concluded and all the working and driving to Boston each week, hardly made enough money to cover the gas he spent on his trip there, amounting to nothing. Years passed and his reliable customers were now either retired or dead, but Willy held onto the faith that the new generation would give him the respect he needed and deserved. However, in his wrongness, he became crushed by the harsh reality that he is "a nobody" now, and feels useless, as if his life might as well be over, because he no longer receives his "smile or a shoeshine."

In Miller's interpretation of the "American Dream," he focuses on the message of reconsidering the ideals of athleticism, male friendships, popularity, and unpopular success. However, not all Americans will succeed, men do sometimes cry, and having a son is no guarantee of masculinity or success.

"Although Willy's feelings of loss and impermanence are intensified and partly caused by his lack of success, his predicament has more complex origins. In the face of declining earning power and approaching death, he would keep what he does not have and provide what is not allowed" (Oberg, 2656.)

Oberg explains in his essay that the Lomans tend to use a false perception to hold off the night when they will have to admit what they try to hide: their unhappiness and failure. In contrast, Charley, the Loman's good neighbor, and his son use this perception to reflect the perspective and ambition that's often necessary in the search for success. With the exception of those moments when honesty is required, Willy is kept by language that attempts to bring hope to a situation that excludes it.

"The salesman is a 'small man' who fails to cope with his environment... He has accepted an ideal shaped for him and pressed on him by forces in his culture... He is committed to its objectives and defined by its characteristics" (Porter, 2657.)

Porter portrays the "rags-to-riches" possiblity of the "American Dream" romantically. Loman's society idolized the "successful man": an image of the hard-working, early-rising, self-disciplined, ambitious, industrious, honest, and determined man that could most likely mine diamonds at home, in the city, or wherever he was. The "rags-to-riches" possibility shows how a man of humble origin takes advantage on his opportunities and, by "pluck and luck," rises to the top just by being diligent, cautious, dedicated, and using common sense. In Loman's opinion the key to success is not genius, but character, or a having well-liked personality.

"Miller's play is an anti-myth, the 'rags-to-riches' formula in reverse so that it becomes the story of a failure in terms of success, or better, the story of the failure of the success myth. The 'rags-to-riches' Dream never materializes, and the salesman never escapes his rags. In the collapse of the salesman, Miller attempts to illustrate the collapse of the myth" (Porter, 2658.)

Death of a Salesman covers two extents: the dream-world of success with its memories of past triumphs, hints of victories to come, glimmering opportunities and possibilities; and the actual world of the small, brick-enclosed house in Brooklyn. Willy is a "low man" on the economic and social totem-pole. He is a white-collar worker who works on salary and commission for a company, with his financial future at the mercy of his employer. He does not show any noticeable intellectual capacity or training, and his wisdom, is gained from commonsense and experience. When he is away from home, his moral life behaves according to the "traveling salesman" tradition. On the road, alone and overwhelmed with doubts, without his wife, Linda, and his sons to boost his ego, he turns to The Woman. Willy is unfaithful to his long-suffering wife, but this infidelity is caused by his loneliness on the road, a cure to his diminishing spirits and the rejections he has faced throughout the day.

In a sequence with Ben, Willy remembers his father who was a traveling salesman, as well. Their father disappeared one day when Willy was a baby, following the Yukon gold-strike. He lived many years in Alaska, and Willy had a yearning to join him there.

"He is a product of a producer-consumer society. Society has labeled him, and Willy has accepted the label; society has offered Willy a set of values and an objective, and Willy has committed himself to those values and that objective. In so accepting, Willy becomes The Salesman" (Porter, 2659.)

He can't define himself in any other terms, so he insists in his debate with Charley that "he has a job," that he is the "New England man," even after he has been fired. His devotion to the cult of personality, of being "well-liked," is a reflection of his identity; before he sells anything, he must sell himself. He has been shaped by a society that believed in the success myth, the image of the older, freer America. For Willy, the achievement possible in this earlier society is personified in Uncle Ben, who carries the air of success, as well as possesses the precious secret to success. It is summarized in his ritual chant, the formula which sums up his accomplishment: "When I was seventeen I walked into the jungle and when I was twenty-one I walked out. And by God I was rich" (Miller's play, 1920.) To Willy, Uncle Ben is the obvious proof of his doctrine.

Willy accepts the approach to success of "winning friends and influencing people," he discovers signs which characterize the personality likely to succeed in his sons: physically strong, well-built, and attractive. Biff is a football hero, the captain of the high-school team; Happy has a pleasant personality and basks in Biff's reflected glory. As high-school boys, they are leaders, popular with the crowd, athletic and handsome. Their present status of womanizing clerk and wandering farmhand cannot erase the potential glory of their past, as Willy remembers them. Biff has been a thief from his high-school days; stealing a football from the locker-room and lumber from a local construction job, even being imprisoned for a few months a few years after high school. While Happy dates the fiancés and girlfriends of fellow employees who are in higher positions than him. But personality has its privileges and Willy can wink at the boys' faults in the name of personality and fearless competitiveness. The boys have been brought up to respect the success ideology; their success will be the salesman's justification. He fights to hold on to his identity, even if success passes him by, he can still look forward to a justification of his life in them.

"Dad is never so happy as when he's looking forward to something!" (Miller's play, 1950.) When Willy is lost or anxious, he demands that his hope be fed, because it keeps him going. Willy's whole life has been shaped by his commitment to, and dream based on, the success myth; his ongoing dilemma is the inevitable consequence of this dream and commitment. Biff and Happy are lost and confused by their failure to get ahead, and Willy is at the end of his rope because he can no longer sell, which is the only thing he knows how to do. In spite of their failures, the three men fall back into old habits of extreme wishful thinking, such as Happy's attempt to regain the Loman fortune with his "Loman Brothers". Only the glowing Loman boys, who ran to carry their father's luggage and listen to his prideful tales of his glamorous trips as a salesman, would consider such a scheme achievable. It is significant that Happy makes the proposal, because he is the spiting image of his father, a liar and a philanderer. But under the spell of the dream, all difficulties, past and present, are smoothed over by a flooding optimism. Biff decides to see Bill Oliver, a former employer, and ask for financial backing for the "Loman Brothers" plan; while Willy decides to ask his boss for a place in New York for himself, for an office job that would take him off the road. Unfortunately, their confident plans backfire, Biff couldn't even get inside Oliver's office and he steals a pen from his desk, while Willy's rambling convinces his boss that the company has no more use for him.

Contrary to this picture of the glowing athlete and the popular fellow is Charley's son Bernard, the neighbor's boy, who wears glasses, studies hard, and is not well-liked, ends up a successful lawyer who tries cases before the Supreme Court. Willy runs into Bernard on his way to speak with Charley, and in desperation asks him about the secret to success. Bernard doesn't volunteer any advice except to not to worry about it, "sometimes, Willy, it's better for a man just to walk away." But Willy can't walk away. Charley, the fat oaf neighbor, is a successful businessman and Bernard, the bespectacled tag-along, is a successful lawyer. Out of the goodness of his heart, Charley supports Willy and Linda by "loaning" the salesman fifty dollars a week, drops by to play cards with Willy and tolerates his irritability, even offers Willy a steady job, after Willy loses his. Charley had no theory about success, no magic formula but unconcern, "my salvation is that I never took any interest in anything" (Miller's play, 1944.) He never preached to his son or demonstrated any interest in success or money. Though Bernard boyhood relations with the Lomans kept him an outcast, he holds no grudge. He followed his father's example, if not his counsel.

At the restaurant, Biff explains to Happy, after his experience at Bill Oliver's, that his whole life has be "a ridiculous lie." He is determined to get the facts out in the open, but habit is not so easily broken. Their father refuses to listen; he will have a celebration of the glorious future. When it becomes clear that Biff will not cooperate in the lie, and that Willy cannot face the truth, the Loman boys react according to the pattern, by running away from their father's failure and from their own failure. Biff's failure with Oliver is related to his failure in math and his trip to Boston. Relying on personality, Biff had mimicked the instructor to his face and had cut the class for football practice. In spite of Bernard's help on the exam, he lacked four points of passing, and the instructor refused to make a compromise. When the boy runs to seek his father's help, he finds the Woman in Willy's hotel room; his idol and ideals crumble; his father is "a phoney little fake." Biff sees the affair as a betrayal of Linda, the family, and the home. Willy's identity of the husband and father is broken, but he doesn't understand Biff's reaction; he feels that what he does on the road has nothing to do with his home-life. Thus all he feels is the weight of his son's disapproval. However, Biff is not to be put off: "The man don't know who we are! The man is gonna know! We never told the truth for ten minutes in this house" (Miller's play, 1964.) Willy is no longer salesman, no longer father; Willy is "the man;" his identity is stripped away. But when Biff breaks down in tears, the removal of his disapproval rekindles Willy's optimism; whatever his failures on the road and in the office, Willy turns out to be "well-liked" by his separated son.

To achieve that unreachable success of the "American Dream", as the play concludes, Willy drives his car into the wall. The success myth is stronger than the reality, and he goes to his death with his unachievable goal sparkling before him. Willy is a talented workman; he has practically rebuilt the house. Biff, who understands this strength in his father, has actually escaped to the West to succeed in his ambition with the satisfaction he finds on the farm. Biff suspects that perhaps the Lomans have been miscast in their salesman role. So when Biff comes to realize who he is, his insight flashes out of the contrast between the office and the open sky. The things he loves in this world are "the work and the food and the time to sit and smoke." And his obituary for his father is a memorial to the good old days when Willy was working on the house: "There's more of him in that front stoop than in all the sales he ever made" (Miller's play, 1968.) After the nightmare in the office and the restaurant, Willy feels the urge to plant; this instinct to put something that grows in the ground, is unsuccessful-he must work in the hard-packed dirt, but the seeds will not grow. His suicide will bring twenty thousand "on the barrelhead." This insurance money is the "diamond" he sees shining in the dark. The dream of diamonds and his idealization of Ben have "rung up a zero"; the only way he can make his life pay off is by self-destruction.

"Willy the Salesman represents all those Americans caught in the mesh of the myth and the moral pressures it generates. He battles to retain his faith, is shaken by doubts about his ability to live according to his belief, humiliates himself to discover the secret that lies at its heart. Thus, when he goes to his death without knowing why he has lived or why he is dying, he fulfills the destiny of the type, but as an individual who has suffered, he remains unfulfilled" (Porter, 2664.)

Miller exaggerates the problem of guilt and the reality of Willy's suffering because of his values, but he can neither bring Willy to understand his failure nor release him from it. Miller recognizes this and struggles to fix it; but in the end the myth defeats him. The false values, tightly woven into Willy's personality, are visibly destructive, but when Biff, the man who "knows who he is," suggests returning to the farm, it becomes clear that there is no epiphany in which suffering leads to insight. Willy has suffered, but his suffering doesn't bring him to understanding. Miller recognizes this difficulty also and tries to promote Biff to hero, by giving him the insight of which Willy was incapable of. Though Willy goes to the grave without ever knowing who he was, we learn who Willy was through Biff's realization of who he was.

Works Cited

Miller, Arthur. "Tragedy and the Common Man." 1949. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. 1969-1972.

Miller, Arthur. "Death of a Salesman." 1949. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. 1969-1972.

Oberg, Arthur K. "Death of a Salesman and Arthur Miller's Search for Style." The Chelsea House Library of Literary Criticism. Vol. 5. 1967. pp.2654-2657.

Porter, Thomas E. "Acres of Diamonds: Death of a Salesman: Myth and Modern American Drama." The Chelsea House Library of Literary Criticism. Vol. 5. 1969. pp.2657-2665.